Birthday at a Restaurant ......Do you want attention on you or not?

Do you want a bunch of waiters and waitresses, you don't know, going through the motions of singing you "happy birthday", while a bunch of strangers look on (or wonder why they are waiting to get their drink refilled)? Are we the only "spoil sports" who find this stuff annoying and degrading (to the wait staff)?

No insult if you LOVE the guys and gals at Outback singing to you, but I just had to ask.

Do you want a bunch of waiters and waitresses, you don't know, going through the motions of singing you "happy birthday", while a bunch of strangers look on (or wonder why they are waiting to get their drink refilled)? Are we the only
...

Do you want a bunch of waiters and waitresses, you don't know, going through the motions of singing you "happy birthday", while a bunch of strangers look on (or wonder why they are waiting to get their drink refilled)? Are we the only "spoil sports" who find this stuff annoying and degrading (to the wait staff)?

No insult if you LOVE the guys and gals at Outback singing to you, but I just had to ask.

It isn't that bad and when you are doing it for your young child they love the attention.. Most of the time..

Reply

09/11/2012

wdanas

I had this happen to me one time thanks to my mother in law looking to embarrass me. So I turned around and started dancing along with the folks singing happy birthday to me. Mother in law was livid - how dare I not be embarrassed? I felt like I won a small, if petty, victory.

Beyond that I don't care any particular way about it, personally, but we don't make a point to tell the waitstaff or have anyone come sing to the birthday guy/girl.

I don't really like to be the center of attention for anything, especially for something like my birthday, but if it really please's my wife, I probably would still go through with it just for her, but I still won't like it.

Do you want a bunch of waiters and waitresses, you don't know, going through the motions of singing you "happy birthday", while a bunch of strangers look on (or wonder why they are waiting to get their drink refilled)? Are we the only
...

Do you want a bunch of waiters and waitresses, you don't know, going through the motions of singing you "happy birthday", while a bunch of strangers look on (or wonder why they are waiting to get their drink refilled)? Are we the only "spoil sports" who find this stuff annoying and degrading (to the wait staff)?

No insult if you LOVE the guys and gals at Outback singing to you, but I just had to ask.

Do you want a bunch of waiters and waitresses, you don't know, going through the motions of singing you "happy birthday", while a bunch of strangers look on (or wonder why they are waiting to get their drink refilled)? Are we the only
...

Do you want a bunch of waiters and waitresses, you don't know, going through the motions of singing you "happy birthday", while a bunch of strangers look on (or wonder why they are waiting to get their drink refilled)? Are we the only "spoil sports" who find this stuff annoying and degrading (to the wait staff)?

No insult if you LOVE the guys and gals at Outback singing to you, but I just had to ask.

I'm kind of shy, but kind of not. It depends on where I'm at and who I'm with. I definitely don't try for the spotlight, but I would probably just laugh and try and make light of the situation if they began singing to me. I wouldn't freak or get too embarrassed, but I don't like attention on me while receiving gifts or anything like that. I think I'd be okay being sung to though. I remember as kids my best girl friend and my sister and I would go out to eat a lot and each time, we'd tell the waitresses that it was one of our B-days although it never was true except one time, when it was my friend's B-day. So we'd all be surprised when they all came out to sing to one of us. LOL. It was hilarious because we'd switch it up and sometimes I'd go tell them it was my sister's b-day and she'd be looking all crazy when they sung to her, or I'd say it was my friends. Man that was so fun!

So I guess I wouldn't be too embarrassed. We've done it before just for laughs, but I don't really want other kinds of attention. When they're singing to you, the attention is really on them anyways, not you so it's not a huge thing for me.

I don't see why it's degrading. Now I don't think they should be forced to, but everywhere I've ever gone, they've had a lot of fun acting crazy while singing to one of us.

I had this happen to me one time thanks to my mother in law looking to embarrass me. So I turned around and started dancing along with the folks singing happy birthday to me. Mother in law was livid - how dare I not be embarrassed? I felt like I won
...

I had this happen to me one time thanks to my mother in law looking to embarrass me. So I turned around and started dancing along with the folks singing happy birthday to me. Mother in law was livid - how dare I not be embarrassed? I felt like I won a small, if petty, victory.

Beyond that I don't care any particular way about it, personally, but we don't make a point to tell the waitstaff or have anyone come sing to the birthday guy/girl.

Now that's how you do it! LOL. I love that you turned an embarassing situation into something fun, and oh I bet it did chap her a**! LOL. That is awesome that you had the guts to do that.

If it were one of our kids' b-days, I'd so tell the staff and embarrass the living daylights out of them. It's hard to embarrass them. I guess I'm so close in age to them that I can act crazy with them and they just laugh. But I know they'd have red cheeks if I had the staff sing to them AND I SUNG ALONG! Oh yes! This was a perfect thread because our oldest has his 15th B-day in three days! Oh, I don't think I'll be able to resist.

Good thing is when everyone can laugh about it though. That's what I like about my family. We're all shy-ish, but have wonderful laughs at our own and each other's expenses!